


Gwyllt

by RembrandtsWife



Series: Northumberland [3]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Celtic Mythology & Folklore, Fawnlock, Gen, Inspired by Fanart, Mythical Beings & Creatures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-03
Updated: 2013-03-03
Packaged: 2017-12-04 06:12:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/707433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RembrandtsWife/pseuds/RembrandtsWife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The wood has a Guardian, and the Guardian's duty is to know everything that happens in the wood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gwyllt

**Author's Note:**

> This series began with porn and seems to be slowly growing a mythology and a plot. I am very grateful to bennyslegs/Paula and all the other fan artists of Tumblr, who created Fawnlock, and to all the readers who have left kudos and comments on the first three stories. I shall follow my antlered muse wherever he goes. *g*

The human dwelling in the east of the wood had been unoccupied for a long time. Fawnlock had seen visitors come and go in their noisy, poison-spewing horseless vehicles, but none had stayed, even for a night. When he first came to this wood and made it his own, he had visited the human place often, wondering about it, watching it. He had even discovered a way inside, but the dark cold place with its strange furnishings was no improvement over his own cosy den near the spring. In time he had lost interest and ceased to watch the place.

But when a man came and took up residence, Fawnlock had known before the next sunrise. Of course he had: He was the Guardian of this wood, and its denizens reported to him. The birds brought him the news; the fox had something to say; a badger told him the human had even spent the night.

He watched the human dwelling for several days and nights. One of the horseless wagons was hitched on the north side; there were lights within, and smells of food that made him drool and lick his lips. But he did not see the human until the man left the dwelling and went walking through the wood. Fawnlock's wood.

It was absurdly easy to track the man without being noticed. It was true, as his brother had always said, that the humans had forgotten all their old skills, their roots in the world. They could no longer see or hear or smell with any acuity; they were strangers to their own animal nature. This was why they were so destructive to the things of the land and why the Guardians were so necessary.

Fawnlock had not had the opportunity to really observe a human since he was a wean. This human was a male, smaller than himself, who walked with a halting gait, supported by a stick. He was covered in layers of pelts as the humans always were, but the uncovered hair of his head was a light golden color mixed with grey and touches of red when the sun struck it. He moved like one accustomed to walking but out of practice, and the browning of his face and hands showed that he had been out in the open a great deal, not long ago. The way he moved and held himself gave away pain in the left shoulder as well as in the right leg.

He did not stay out in the woods very long. Frustrated, Fawnlock followed him back to the human place and stole close enough to peer in a window and see the man sleeping, a book open on his chest, though it was still light enough that he might be seen. So the humans still had books. He retreated to the cover of the trees and remained watching till moonrise, seeing the glaring artificial lights come on, smelling the smells of cooking, and hearing a faint buzz of music and talk.

He slept late the next morning, then roved out to the west until the sun was past the height, guarding his territory as was his duty. He had hoped that some of the animals at the borders might have news from his brother, but none had seen him. He returned to his den near sunset and was shocked when he approached the rocks and smelled human. Human! But it was his human (as he already thought of the fair-haired man), alone, drinking from the water of the spring.

Fawnlock circled the clearing until he had a clear view of his man. The human was flushed and breathing heavily, drinking from a metal bottle and filling it from the spring to drink again. His stick lay on the rocks. Fawnlock chuckled to himself. He would play a game with this human, to let him know he was not alone. No human was the master here.

He put out a hand and deliberately shook a bush thick with dry brown leaves. It made an excellent rustling noise, which caused the human to start. He capped his metal bottle, then took out an artificial torch. Fawnlock growled softly as its harsh light broke over his dwelling. He began to circle round till he was off to the man's left, out of range of the light, allowing himself to make noise.

The man shifted about, looked at something in his hand, then turned and began retracing the path of the stream, away from Fawnlock's clearing and back toward the human place. Silent as a shadow, Fawnlock followed, weaving back and forth so that he was now on the right of the man, now the left, now trotting before him in the darkness, now following behind. He knew the human's sight was nothing so good as his own, and the artificial light concealed as much as it revealed, deepening the shadows where it did not illumine. Soon the man began to walk faster, less clumsily; Fawnlock noted that he had left his stick behind, but he was doing well without it, his pace quickening and his stride lengthening like any prey animal's.

Containing his laughter, curbing his noises, Fawnlock chased the human straight back through the wood to the clearing, to the rear of the dwelling. The man ran excellently when pushed to it. Fawnlock watched him stumble through the rear door of the dwelling, then permitted himself a laugh. He would have to turn back now if he wanted to return the man's stick before sunrise.

He returned to the human dwelling after sunset the next day, when more smells of cooking filled the clearing. He had long scorned his brother's fondness for human foods cooked with fire, but the rich smells from the house had been making him drool. He drew closer to the house as darkness filled the wood and more lights appeared within, at last coming close enough that if the human looked out, surely Fawnlock would be visible to him.

He had almost given up when suddenly his hopes were fulfilled: A light bloomed above the door he had been watching, and the man stepped outside. In his hand was the artificial torch, but he did not wave it about. He looked out into the woods and spoke aloud, in a warm and soothing tone.

Fawnlock suppressed a huff of frustration. In the time when the stories began, the languages of human and Guardian had not been too far distant, but they were sundered now. He could not be sure what the man was saying, but the tone was not the tone of a threat. And why was he here, if not to show himself? Slowly, cautiously, he stepped out into the clearing, stopping when the glaring artificial light fell on him.

He held still, face calm and muscles soft, as the beam of light moved from his feet to his face. The fair-haired man's face, partly shadowed as it was, showed not fear, but wonder. Fawnlock sniffed; he smelled excitement, strong feeling, the strange artificial smells with which humans covered their true scent, and something else, the tang of metal--ah! A gun. A short, soft word for one of the human kind's most abominable inventions. The man had a gun. But where? It was hidden, not in his hand. He was not receiving Fawnlock like an animal. He did not smell afraid.

Was it possible, then, that the human was , _gwyllt_? If he had a gun, he might have been to war. If he had been to war in some far place, that would explain his sun-browned skin and his still-aching wounds. Men who came back from war, especially if they came back when some they loved did not, were susceptible to turning gwyllt. So were poets and other makers, but there seemed to be fewer and fewer of those. A warrior returned alone from battle might well turn gwyllt and seek solace in solitude, in wilderness, in wildness. It used to be so, in the time from which the stories came. In that time the Guardians would offer succor to the gwyllt, to a man who had run wild.

Fawnlock needed to know more. He needed to smell, watch, listen more, in order to be certain. He tensed when the man changed his stance. Ready to run, ready even to attack. The man relaxed, softened, spoke again in a soothing, coaxing voice. Fawnlock liked that voice, soft and pleasantly rough, like having one's fur rubbed the wrong way and then petted down again. He stepped closer, one step and then another, looking, smelling, and allowing himself to be seen.

The man pointed to his chest and said a word. His name! This was better than Fawnlock had hoped. The human recognized that he was no animal and wanted to communicate. With some difficulty, he repeated the short, inelegant noise that the man had given as his name. "Shaun."

The man bared his teeth widely, the corners of his eyes crinkling up, and said his name again, emphasizing the initial sound. Then he pointed at Fawnlock and asked, quite obviously, "Who are you?"

Fawnlock curled his tongue painfully into place and managed,"DJAWN". He laid a hand on his breast and said his name. The best the human could come out with, however, was a weak approximation: "Fawnlock." It would have to do. He waved a hand to indicate that John should cease struggling, as his attempts seemed to be getting worse and not better.

He was about to approach the door and see if the human would allow him inside when a horrid noise burst upon his ears. Too frightened to think, Fawnlock turned tail and fled.


End file.
